I'm trying to figure out something about dealing with /avoiding conflict.
When I'm in conflict with someone, I'll often avoid confronting them, because I don't trust them. I might like them, but I don't trust their ability to respond appropriately.
I find that honest conversations mean making myself vulnerable to some extent, and if someone has hurt me, or is annoyed with me, it doesn't feel safe to be that vulnerable.
I reserve conversations like that for people who are very close to me, that I trust, like my husband and my father.
I usually hide my anger and annoyance, because it feels like they don't deserve to see my honest emotions.
@Zumbador@actuallyautistic I’m pretty selective about engaging in disagreements/conflict as well. I guess it’s hard to be close if you can’t disagree and engage in conflict though . It’s particularly difficult with NTs though because of the double empathy problem. In my experience they end up thinking I’m callous and get really mad at me.
It sounds like a variation on my coping mechanism. I'm always ready to walk away, no matter who it is or how much space I've created for them in my life. Enough times of figuring out I wasn't as important to someone else as they were to me, and I just decided no one is indispensable. It's my self-protection, as messed up as it may be.
@Zumbador@actuallyautistic different approach, one of the issues we hit is that we often mentally prepare by playing the whole conversation in our heads and prepare for the worst. Reality is often not nearly as harsh. Example, I once was at a music festival trying to sleep and the tent across from us was playing loud music. Mentally I was at war, I would say something, they would call me stupid. Mentioned it to my girlfriend, she walked over and the reply was, oh sure no problem.
@Zumbador@actuallyautistic now I know that running a conversation in my head is part of being autistic and that I need to mentally split between what my head tells me and how reality is. So my suggestion is to check your internal energy levels and take a gamble once in a while. And know it's okay to stop at any time.
People in general have the best intentions, but its not always smooth and this is why I prefer talking to people face to face. You get time to figure things out.
And this is where reality sucks. It can't follow the script.
If people only knew how much energy I put into creating the script, rehearsing it, updating and amending it, rehearsing more. But it's like they don't even care. Instead of following the script, they wander off into topics never mentioned in the script.
@toolsontech
Oh absolutely, this is an important insight that I'm still learning to put into practice.
Interrupting rumination when I notice I doing it, and going into difficult conversations with an open mind rather than trying to control how the other person reacts / feels
@Zumbador@actuallyautistic
Depending on who it is and the circumstances, feeling that you have to hide your feelings isn't ideal. It's a denial of self and your right to be experiencing them. Something we experience far too often as it is.
Confronting people directly is something I tend to avoid though. Mostly because it's rarely worth it, especially if the other person is NT. Certainly the success rate of getting someone else to see my point of view and to actually see why I should be reacting the way I am has never let me believe so yet.
@Zumbador@pathfinder@actuallyautistic
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in ten years I can’t get around this kid’s apparent hatred 💔
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and it’s my main problem in life, been worrying at it every day.
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But they got me wrong, so everything I say is just a new lie and a new crime on my sheet.
@Zumbador@pathfinder@actuallyautistic
Geezuz, June, I guess it’s exactly ten years the anniversary.
Wants to be marked somehow, with a change of some sort, preferably.
What this unlocked for me is the ability to imagine how i could reach comfort in social situations: by releasing myself of the incorrectly assigned responsibility of making the situation go well. Instead, i want to just not care! I don't have to manage their reactions. If ppl suck, that's their issue not mine.
Basically, it's helpful to me to imagine what i wish life was like, so I can compare what the difference is. The difference, IMO, is distancing myself from their reactions. I know people can still hurt me, but I think i'm going too far and stepping across a boundary that really is not my responsibility. I don't need to control my reactions just to try and make people treat me nicely. If they are a horrible person, let that be revealed!
@dyani@pathfinder@actuallyautistic I'm coming back to this article, @dyani as I think there's something very important here but I'm not quite understanding it yet.
It's something like - take a situation that's difficult because I'm autistic. Then imagine it being not difficult, without my being any less autistic in that scenario.
So for example, a relative takes offense at something I'm saying because they read tone and meaning that's not there. So now I'm angry and anxious because I know I need to be clear in my communication, but I'm worried that they'll read that as being "too blunt" or "angry" or whatever.
So I need to imagine that I am clear, and say what I mean. If that person reacts badly, that's on them, I'll deal with it if it happens.
It's almost like an equation. (A) We know we are autistic, that can't be changed. (B) We know we are already doing our very best, that's another factor. (C) We know how we want to feel at the end of an interaction: like we expressed ourselves, like we didn't mask to our detriment, like we are calm & not stressed about the interaction. (X) But we can't know what people are thinking, or how they will react.
@dyani@pathfinder@actuallyautistic Hmmm. OK. I'd not considered B, I think that bit is important.
And in order to do this whole thing, I first need to be clear what is in my control, and what is not, and focus only on things that I can actually do something about.
That lesson, about "only focus on what I can control" was a big breakthrough in dealing with my anxiety, but it seems I constantly have to learn it over an over again, I keep falling into the same patterns again.
yeah, only worry about what is in your control. and this thought experiment is to highlight where we are doing too much, going too far to try and get others to act a certain way (understandably! because we've been hurt a lot).
also, i think seeking control is a human thing. we always seek control, it makes us feel safer. so i bet we'll have to remind ourselves of that for the rest of our lives!